My Apologies.

Per request from STEFANIE and several other people, this blog is for you :) 

I was bored earlier this afternoon and randomly decided "Hey, I wanna make cupcakes". Truth be told, I like to experiment when I make stuff..sometimes it works in my favor, sometimes it doesn't. Eric rolls his eyes when he see's me adding food coloring to stuff... I like to play with my food, per say. Makes it a lil more fun when I make pink pancakes, tie dye cupcakes, blue rice krispies... random, but different. 

I'm really not a fan of chocolate. Given, I live in Belgium where I'm surrounded by AMAZING chocolate, but I just don't really indulge in it considering I'm more of a fruit type of person. Hell, I never have a cake for my birthday.. I always have pie (Lemon Meringue or Razzleberry). True story. 

By the way, I'll shamelessly plug Pampered Chef since I used my PC goodies to make this recipe.  *Grin*

So, I happened to have an extra box of cake mix left over from when I made the Black Forrest Trifle for a party I went to not too long ago. 

I followed the directions that were on the box, but instead of using vegetable oil (I didn't have any), I just used 1/2 a cup of Challenge butter (unsalted).  I melted the butter in my Micro-Cooker since it needed to be softened before I could blend all the ingredients together.I used my Stainless Steel Mixing Bowls (one for the batter, another for the icing) and used a lil electric mixer since I figured if I blended the batter like crazy, it should put a good amount of air in the cakes so they'd be fluffy (I was right!). 

 Using some Reynolds cupcake foils, I baked the cupcakes in my Muffin Pan for about 25 minutes at 325* (I used my Weight Watchers ladle to put the right amount of batter in the cups). 

While the oven was working it's magic, I started to figure out what I wanted to do as far as icing. I had a container of Betty Crockers Cream Cheese Frosting, but in all honesty, it was way too sweet for me. It was bound to give me a headache because of how distinct the sugar taste was. So, I started experimenting! 

Cue in: Almond Extract!

I emptied out the container of frosting into my 2qt stainless mixing bowl with my Small Mix N Scraper (it's a life saver and gets every molecule of whatever it is you're scraping) then proceeded to use my mini hand blender. Truth be told, the spout on the bottle of Almond Extract is a lil on the large side so when I was adding the extract, a lot came out. My ballpark guess is that I used about 1.5 tablespoons worth (it'll smell REALLY almondy!) Then I mixed in 3/4 of a stick of Challenge butter (softened). Yes, it sounds super fatty, but the butter really toned down all the sugar! To tone down some of the Almond, I actually put in a hefty spoonful of milk chocolate frosting (another flavor from Betty Crocker ). It gave the icing some color (a very light tan color) and it put a lil chocolate twist to it. Mixed it even more and set it in the fridge till I was done baking all the cupcakes and they were cooled. 

When the cakes were done, I had 'em hang out my Stackable Cooling Rack for about an hour to ensure they were completely cooled off since I didn't want the icing to melt off. Once they were ready, I pulled out my Easy Accent Decorator and started filling it up with the icing mixture (used the star accent tip) and started going to town on the cakes. Poor lil things didn't have a chance since I smothered them in the icy goodness. After all was said and done, my little army was almost complete. The final thing that needed to be done?

SPRINKLES.

 

I absolutely LOVE Pampered Chefs Sweet Caramel Sprinkles...I use it pretty often if I'm wanting to make a sweet snack (toast, a slather of cream cheese and this sprinkled on top). That, or I use their Sweet Apple Sprinkles (they're amazing!!)

Anyway, here's the finished result:

They came out VERY light and fluffy, even with the icing! Calorie-wise, it's not light. In fact, It's extremely fattening, but ya know what... we all deserve a splurge from time to time :) 

ENJOY!